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[mojojojo]

Yes, Milantarik that story is one of my favourites in the air war history.

It was the day when the US made its first ace of the war (Cunningham and Driscoll - Navy), when the second US ace of the war (Steve Ritchie - USAF) scored his first kill while flying the most prolific F-4 of the war (a/c 463 that ended the war with 6 kills).

It was also the day when two highly skilled pilots clashed (Cunningham and Driscoll last kill that is worth reading about), the day both sides lost highly skilled pilots in air to air combat (Col. Toon -VPAF and Maj Lodge-USAF) and the day that started the longest period a downed pilot evaded capture of the war (23 days Capt. Locher).

Not to mention it recorded the highest number of MiGs down in a single day.

Very important day for modern aviation and still it is reaching its 40 anniversary tomorrow!

 

well technically they lost toon, but he probably wasnt a real person

[Texx]

You are right Mojojojo, Col. Toon aka Tomb was probably a propaganda character.

Nevertheless the pilot that Cunnigham shot down as his 5th kill was an outstanding one. Cunningham narrative of this combat is a lesson in air combat maneuvering and how to use vertical rolling scisors!! I think that air combat series of the Discovery Channel pictured it.

I did skin which is believed to be the aircraft flown by this pilot, shown here in a ficticious Crusader kill 

[mojojojo]

yes i saw a episode of dogfights about it. he sure put up a fight!

[BT~Tarik]

Well apparently this pilot did make an error at last, which made Cunningham obtain the kill :

What followed was the epic battle, in which both planes engaged in four subsequent series of vertical rolling scissors, until the better training of Cunningham and the power of his trusty F-4J prevailed and the MiG dived away to make a fundamental error of opening the range and presenting his tail. The American made the most of the opportunity. He curved after the enemy plane, placed the gunsight pipper over it and squeezed the trigger. The Sidewinder detonated beside the tail of the MiG, which didn’t blew up, but simply flew into the ground.

[Kazegami]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nguyen_Toon

In the years after the war during the 1990s, American military officers visiting Vietnam have said that some of their Vietnamese hosts privately admitted to them that Colonel Toon/Tomb actually never existed and that he was a long-standing, successful propaganda fabrication.